


chasing crows

by eraserheadbaby



Category: Fate/Apocrypha, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms
Genre: Canon - Anime, F/M, Introspection, and tell her shell end up shipping achilles and atalanta, as a greek i wanna go back in time t find 10yo me whos learning abt mythology in school
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-05
Updated: 2019-11-05
Packaged: 2021-01-23 21:02:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21326626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eraserheadbaby/pseuds/eraserheadbaby
Summary: If she truly is to die for her wish, she just prays to the Goddess so that it will be at the hands of a fool like her Brother.
Relationships: Achilles | Rider of Red/Atalanta | Archer of Red
Comments: 3
Kudos: 26





	chasing crows

The flight of the arrow through the sky, until it meets its wooden destination against a nearby tree, is an unceremonious one. It's only accompanied by a gust of wind, as a spear does aimless swings around its holder and the dead leaves of the forest all around.

Archer is used to training alone. It's not even training, really, as it lacks the purpose it needs to merit that title. She pulls the string of her bow, her third hand unmade of skin, and throws her arrows around and over the tree trunks, just to dispel whatever unlikely rust her limbs have accumulated. Rider, the one swaying his godly spear close to her, is certainly following the same line of thought. They were both summoned for this war, undetermined and alone in space and time, but before, they lived in the same lands and bowed before the same principles- a body that was not properly trained at all times was no body at all.

Rider's movements come with a bleary edge to them, and that, to Archer's eyes, sheds enough light at his unfamiliarity with solitary training. He raises his arm as if expecting a reflection of his hit from a teacher, and his kick would seem more fitting in a fight between students in a palaestra.

For Archer, Rider's words had betrayed him long before his body. Her name appearing in the tales of his father was enough to make her not just his partner for this incongruous war, but his Sister.

As if his arrogance rewards him with mind-reading abilities, the better to know when he's in someone's thoughts, he turns at her and smirks. The haughty mirth in his eyes is one Archer is used to seeing in men's eyes. Men who sought to fulfill their desires on her with no remorse. Men that besieged her with insults and even battles, her superiority an unswallowable dreg in their throats. Men that abandon their daughters on mountains, to the mercy of the Gods.

She has killed many of these men before.

Archer raises her bow, aiming at Rider, even when he's but a specter of a target, even when she has no intention of letting the string of her bow loose. Not one to ever retreat from even the most inconsequential of clashes, he smudges his grin all around his face and starts running. Archer chases after her spurious, irrational prey, not knowing why.

From there, it's running and running. Her limbs move, but her mind is stock-still, petrified on those memories of bitter sorrows. So now she runs, not after Rider, not after the men that wronged her, but after the wish that gave her life again, the wish that will allow her to clean this world from anyone opposing to it.

Archer's blessed feet bring her to a clearing. She has long lost sight of Rider, but it's not like she had it in the first place. Alone and with the lifeless green as her only chaperone, she remembers being a child and waiting for someone, anyone. Now, her arrows fall as thunder amongst the clouds- she will kill men that wrong their daughters, she will kill their wives that let this pass, she will kill families that let unwanted children die alone-

She will kill them all-

“Stop, Sis.”

Archer feels the weary palm on her shoulder before she hears the voice, and she doesn't dare question the affection they strew somewhere inside her. Her last arrow snaps against a twig and falls limp, just as her mind returns to the forest where her body has been all this time. Behind her, Rider looks straight into her, and in this moment, his eyes seem more almighty than both his spear and his divine chariot. For what Archer sees in them, she's never seen before in human eyes- worry. Rider is worried for his Sister.

What a fool he is.

The only thread connecting her to the spider web of life, of this age, of this war, is her wish, the undisclosed dream no one could inherit. Just as her wish gave her back her life, it can just as easily take it back. And for this reason, she will only let her own wish, and no one else's, take her down.

If she truly is to die for her wish, she just prays to the Goddess so that it will be at the hands of a fool like her Brother.

**Author's Note:**

> *gets into fate 756976298791 years late and first writes abt a random ass pairing from my least fave series* rawr XD im so random


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